6:54 AM,
Oct. 15, 2012

Nurses have constant interaction with patients, which is one of the reasons they are experts on hospital quality.

Written by

Mary Elizabeth Dallas
| HealthDay

The easiest way to assess a hospital's quality of care might be to just ask the nurses, new research suggests.

One reason nurses tend to have accurate perceptions about quality of care in the hospital where they work is that they are on the front lines and are most familiar with the daily experiences of their patients, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing pointed out.

"For a complete picture of hospital performance, data from nurses is essential," the study's lead author, Matthew McHugh, a public health policy expert at Penn Nursing, said in a university news ...